Backside contacts have been conventionally provided in the integrated circuit (IC) chip to facilitate heat dissipation from the IC chip to a thermal sink located on a back surface of the IC chip. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,773,952 issued on Aug. 10, 2004 to Armburst et al. for “SEMICONDUCTOR CHIP STRUCTURES WITH EMBEDDED THERMAL CONDUCTORS AND A THERMAL SINK DISPOSED OVER OPPOSING SUBSTRATE SURFACES” and U.S. Pat. No. 7,049,695 issued on May 23, 2006 to Pogge for “METHOD AND DEVICE FOR HEAT DISSIPATION IN SEMICONDUCTOR MODULES.”
However, such conventional backside contacts do not directly contact any semiconductor devices located on the front surface of the IC chip, and they do not perform any function besides facilitating heat dissipation.